


When you assume...

by awishturnedwell



Category: Soul Eater
Genre: Assumptions, F/M, Fluff, Fluff Eater, Marriage Proposal, another oldie but goodie, commitment issues, fluffeater, is that a thing?, oh boy oh boy, reverse proposal??, y'all are gonna start getting my old work poured into old fandoms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-27
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2019-09-28 11:27:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17182088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/awishturnedwell/pseuds/awishturnedwell
Summary: Soul is absolutely 100% sure that Maka is afraid of commitment.  But he never actually asked her.





	When you assume...

**Author's Note:**

> This is not proofread AT ALL.

Maka Albarn, like many women before her, knew when she was ready for marriage.

People thought a lot of things about her. She could practically hear them thinking. It wasn’t so different from reading soul wavelengths.

People thought she was too hung up on her mother, had commitment issues, was too nerdy to have common sense, didn’t believe in romance, was too competitive, and a bunch of other things they really didn’t know anything about.

Now, Maka could admit – if only recently – that she had an interesting set of issues when it came to her Mama. However, didn’t they say acknowledging the problem was the first step to fixing it?

It helped to have Soul around. He had stopped thinking most of those things by the first month of their friendship. She figured he’d stopped thinking the rest when they started dating.

Apparently, she’d been wrong. (And it was hard for her to admit something like that.)

 

One rainy Tuesday, Maka was doing the laundry. She liked doing it Tuesdays because they usually had Wednesdays off.

She was wandering around the apartment looking for all the clothes Soul liked to leave randomly lying around. The worst place was his old bedroom. They’d decided to make it into a sort of game room and all their console were set up there. Soul liked to detox in there when people annoyed him and he always seemed to take off his shirt within the first thirty minutes. Maka wasn’t really sure why.

On other days, when they had a really stressful, difficult mission or something happened that made him worry about her, he had a different pattern.

She couldn’t always predict when it would happen, but sometimes when they were standing outside their apartment at the top of the stairs and she was fumbling for the house keys he would roughly push her against the wall and begin attacking her mouth. It was as if he had to reassure himself of her strength. It always seemed to devolve into some fairly PG to PG-13 rating before he began running his fingers through her hair repeatedly. Then his kisses would turn soft, slow, loving and he would be fine again.

Then he’d snag her keys, open the door, and disappear into the game room. She could usually hear him yelling at Black*Star over the headsets and she always found pants, shirts, and socks all over the room.

It had happened twice in the past week. And he’d been in heavy gaming kick since one of his favorite games had just released a sequel. So she’d set her laundry basket down and was literally crawling around on the floor trying to find any runaway socks under the beanbag chairs and stacks of games.

That was when she found it. The ring.

It was in a box in a pair of pants that had somehow ended up behind the entertainment center. And, really, he should have known better than to keep it in his clothes if it was a secret. Maka always did the laundry.

So Maka put it back where she found it and scattered his clothes back around the room.

She also wasn’t surprised when two hours later he came home panting. “Are you already doing laundry?” She could read the panic in face. If she didn’t already know what was wrong she would have been deeply suspicious.

“I’ve only finished the first load.” Of course, that was because she’d been waiting for him to get home for the last hour so that she could do the second load without letting on that she knew his secret.

“Ah, yeah, okay, cool. Let me help then.” He rushed straight into the game room. Maka shook her head. He was practically transparent.

Now that she was thinking about, that explained why her father had been so extra weepy on the phone the last few times and had refused to meet her for their weekly Sunday breakfast. Maka had always figured Soul would be the traditional type and ask for permission.

She knew the ring stayed in the game room after that, but she made no effort to look for it. Maybe he was just trying to find the perfect time.

 

So Maka waited out the two weeks of her father weeping on the phone and then the week of him weeping in person. She waited out the anniversary of them becoming partners. She waited out the anniversary of the roommate agreement that made them friends. She waited out their relationship anniversary. And that was it.

It had been a perfect day. Their anniversary happened to fall on Sunday that year so she let him sleep in when she went to breakfast with her father. When she got back he was awake and whistling cheerfully… and wearing nothing in their kitchen.

After a relatively brief interlude he invited her out to her favorite ice-cream parlor where he presented her with a book she’d been debating buying. She grinned and told him that it was perfect since she was going to be bored all afternoon and he had better love her forever for the strings she had pulled for him.

Then she had him drive to the local basketball stadium. She had tickets for the game later that week (with a choice for either her OR Black*Star to be his plus one), but the surprise was even better. The team had come into town early to take a bit of a break and Maka and gotten them an invitation to come meet the team. Maka spent most of the afternoon reading in the bleachers while Soul played a series of games.

Finally, Soul came over and plopped down next to her. The team was still going, but Soul was dripping with sweat and panting. “That… was… amazing. Best girlfriend ever. Now I just need you to carry me home.”

Maka raised an eyebrow. If he was serious… “No, no, I’m kidding!”

She winked and tucked her new book into her purse. “Does that mean you’re ready to go then?”

He gave a nod and trudged after her to the bike. She wondered if she would need to drive them home. She’d done it before, but only when it was too dangerous for him to do it. But he climbed on and seemed ready to go.

When they got back to the house he took a shower and didn’t even invite her to join him. He did, however, invite her to nap with him. She declined and curled up on the couch with the TV on. Maka figured that was the end of their big date day. They would maybe get some takeout and he would light some candles. Then they’d watch a movie.

She was surprised, then, when he woke up a good two hours before she expected and bounded into the living room. “Ready for the actual date?”

Maka felt her mouth drop open slightly to gape like a fish. “Actual date? Did you have something planned?”

He just grinned enigmatically and ushered her back into their room. He told her to wear something comfortable, but sexy. She laughed because that just wasn’t how her wardrobe worked. He stuck his tongue out at her and slipped on his leather jacket. Taking this as a cue, she put on jeans and a jacket to go over her shirt.

Twenty minutes later found them outside Stein’s place. When Soul went inside for a few minutes, then came back out with what appeared to be a picnic basket, Maka eyed it warily. “Is that going to be okay to eat?”

Soul looked faintly offended. “Stein’s out of town and I knew Marie wouldn’t eat it like Black*Star would have. I couldn’t have you finding it in the fridge.”

Reassured, she settled back to enjoy the ride as he took her deep into the desert.

By the time they arrived, they were in the middle of nowhere and it was a little past sunset. They were in a rocky part of the desert that was almost mountainous.

The moon was bright as Soul set up the picnic site on a giant, surprisingly flat rock. They turned on a lantern long enough to eat the almost gourmet food he’d packed. Then they both settled back into the extra blankets he’d packed.

Maka was just wondering how he’d made it all fit in his bike when it struck her that this would be the perfect time for him to propose.

Suddenly she couldn’t control her heartbeat. Rom-coms had taught her not to let on that she knew. But the reality was that unless he was distracting her – which, admittedly, he was good at – she couldn’t stop thinking about it.

She thought about it all night through the drive home, the cuddling in bed, and the first hour of his faint snoring.

He hadn’t asked her.

And that was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

He had the ring. A ring she liked, in fact.

He had asked permission from her papa.

He had created the perfect date atmosphere for this.

What was wrong?!

She finally fell asleep still thinking about it.

The next morning she woke up with a fully formed plan already in her mind. Let Soul tease her about being a nerd, but her brain knew what it was doing.

She left him a note about having to run errands and went straight to the jewelry store.

Luckily, since this was Death City, the jewelers already had a large selection of rings for men and women in the style she wanted. She did finally decide to get it partially custom-made. After finalizing her order, Maka headed off to do some work-related shopping.

 

The ring was supposed to take about a month. The clerk called her and asked if she minded it being a week or two longer than expected. She told him she cared more about the quality than the time it took and he seemed relieved.

The whole time she kept wondering if he would ask her. There were so many perfect opportunities. He never did.

Then, the day before she was supposed to pick up the ring, she felt his soul debating something. He must not have known she was home because his wavelength was loud.

Maka could feel the thoughts behind his debate. He thought she had commitment issues!

Her initial reaction was fury. He should know her better by now! How could he think she wasn’t ready for marriage? They’d been in a committed relationship for years now. And how dare he make assumptions instead of talking to her?!

Her secondary reaction was understanding. This was why he hadn’t proposed. He was still scared that she was going to run away. Well Maka Albarn ran from nothing and she would show him that. Soon.

She told him not to make plans for Saturday night.

 

She made the whole thing really simple. Nothing too fancy. No opportunities to mess it up.

He was sent out to hang out with Black*Star all afternoon while she got the apartment ready. She rented their favorite movie, ordered Chinese takeout from his favorite place, lit a bunch of candles, got rid of Blair (which wasn’t hard since she was hardly ever home anyway these days,) and set up the couch to be the perfect cuddling spot. She hid the ring box under the entertainment center where she knew it would be easy to find when the time came.

When he came home, he seemed pleasantly surprised by the red and black lilies and the date setup, but not suspicious of her motives.

It was just a really pleasant night. When the movie ended he started kissing her neck. She laughed and told him to hold that thought.

He sat up a little as she moved the entertainment center so when she turned around on one knee with the box in her hand he was at least facing her.

His expression was priceless. Maka suddenly wished she was recording the whole thing. “Seth Soul Eater Evans, will you marry me?” She opened the box to reveal the ring. It was platinum with a stylized skull as the stone setting. The eyes had little “souls” roughly in the shape of his and her souls.

“Maka, what… I don’t…” Soul seemed to be at a complete loss for words.

“Will you marry me?” It was a yes or no question. Maka figured she’d just have to keep repeating it until he answered.

“I was supposed to be the one to propose!”

Maka laughed at his indignation. “Will you marry me Soul?”

“I just… yes, of course damnit!” He lunged off the couch and hugged her so tightly she thought her ribs might crack. Her back certainly did.

She waited patiently for all of two seconds before squirming. “Sooouuul… I want to put the ring on you!” She had fumbled it out of the box during the hug and was trying to hold it up to his face.

“Let me see it first!” He had to wrestle her to the ground to get it from her. She was embarrassed to show him the engraving on the inside. Sitting on top of her, he found their souls again, carved into the platinum in greater detail than he would have expected for something so small and the word “forever.” It was simple, but so sweet he was left breathless for a minute.

Maka punched him in the leg until he let her up again. She was blushing brightly and he just thought it was the cutest thing he’d ever seen her do. “Hold on, I’ll be right back.” He took the ring with him. Still not on his finger.

A minute or so later he came back with a small black velvet box. The ring he’d gotten her was far more traditional with white gold and a diamond. It was perfect for an engagement ring. They’d buy her wedding ring together. “Will you accept mine?”

“Or course silly!” It was her turn to lunge and hug. “But I get to put mine on you first because I actually had the balls to propose.”

As Soul squawked indignantly she slipped the ring on his finger. They belonged together. This was just another way they proved it.

 

A few weeks later, Maka was still glowing over the whole thing, but not thinking about it as actively. So she was surprised when Soul stormed into their room and shouted “You asked my parents for their permission?!”

This was just how they were. Never able to follow traditional paths in a traditional manner. Hopefully, they would keep being this way for the rest of their lives.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope nobody hates me, but I find it hard to believe that Soul is his real first name. I just feel like no one knows except his family and Maka and he’s even convinced his family to call him Soul. But when Maka proposes, she’s proposing to all of him.


End file.
